Swearing at the Rocks on the Pavement
by Ruler of the Fake Empire
Summary: "Why have we stopped? Did we break down?" Draco looks over at him with a sneer, lip curled in anticipation of the words he's about to spit. Only he doesn't spit them, because he's tired and, surprisingly, Potter is actually pretty far down on the list of things he hates right now, sitting snugly right below the tiny, spiky and stupid lizards on their indifferent rocks.


The question he should have been asking was very clear and certain, and he was clearly and certainly not thinking it.

He probably would, at some point, but what he was really thinking was quite different. Most of it was a long and painstakingly put together train of profanity that increased intensity as it went along, occasionally taking the courtesy of escaping his lips because _really_ , what was going on here? And in what past life had he committed such a heinous crime that would land him this sand filled hellhole? He must have been a cannibal or something, joined a cult and participated in ritual human sacrifice, or started a war, or, he didn't know, gone into the oil business and corrupted third world countries, because if he didn't he is going to need to speak to whoever is in charge and demand very loudly a very lengthy explanation that may or may not have included groveling from the second party.

Needless to say Draco Malfoy is pretty pissed off at the circumstances in which he has found himself.

He leans on the bonnet of his father's nicest and most expensive car, smoking an angry cigarette and swearing at the horizon that stretches out before him, spotted by tiny and spiky and _stupid_ little shrubs and tiny and spiky and _stupid_ little lizards that lie on rocks, indifferent to his imminent demise. He pretends to be indifferent to them as well. Mostly he just sneers.

He takes a drag on his cigarette, sucking the foul smoke into his lungs and then blowing it back out again out of the corner of his mouth, flicking his hair out of his eyes.

"Fuck," he tells the horizon pointedly, "fuck _you_ , fuck _everything_. Fuck sand, I hate sand, why couldn't we break down in New York or Paris or something? This is shit." He takes another drag again, the sun boring down at him and making the back of his neck sweat. He swears at that too, taking the time to tap the ash from the end of his cigarette onto the road, because he hates the road and he has officially run out of fucks to give.

Harry comes and stands next to him, hands in pockets, hair going in all directions, glasses askew, he had been asleep in the back seat for the past four hours which is why Draco had gone outside to smoke and swear, he's considerate like that. Also, the car is beginning to smell like gasoline, toothpaste, and fast food. It's an unpleasant combination, and he is more than capable of explaining, at length, that being in that car is a lot like inhaling toxic fumes and always feeling vaguely, and disturbingly hungry.

"Why have we stopped? Did we break down?" Draco looks over at him with a sneer, lip curled in anticipation of the words he's about to spit. Only he doesn't spit them, because he's tired and, surprisingly, Potter is actually pretty far down on the list of things he hates right now, sitting snugly right below the tiny, spiky and stupid lizards on their indifferent rocks.

So he just runs his hand through his hair, smoking cigarette perched between two of his fingers, and sighs.

"Gas leak, no fuel."

He even manages not to swear, he is pretty proud of himself; someone needs to give him an award or something. He smirks to himself and takes another drag on his cigarette. He's feeling entirely too optimistic now that Potter has emerged from his hovel in the back seat. He needs to think something cynical. He wreaks his brain for something that tastes just right in his mouth and perfectly expresses his feelings about the situation, Potter or otherwise.

He finds it pretty easily.

"Fuck me sideways this is crap."

This is sufficient.

Potter laughs and it's a good sound and Draco almost asks him to do it again. But he doesn't, he just smokes and thinks about swearing and just how much he would like a very big, very cold glass of beer right about now.

Potter leans backs on the bonnet of the car, and folds his arms across his chest.

"So what are we going to do?"

Draco cannot think of one good reason why Potter is asking him, of all people, it's not like he has given a single indication that he has a plan, or that he's in charge. He's not in charge. He just drives.

"We walk, I suppose." He drops his dead cigarette onto the road and crushes it beneath the heal of his boot. "We passed a town a little way back, it probably has a motel, a place to buy gas."

So that's what they do, taking two bags, one for each of them, packed with the essentials, and barely anything else, they push Draco's father's expensive car off the road, leave a threatening note on the windscreen dictating that one of them is a bounty hunter who keeps a string of teeth around his neck from his victims and the other one is in a gang and runs a very sophisticated crime syndicate and should someone choose to steal the car they would simply be forced to have them beheaded, and then, they begin to walk.

…

There are two very specific reasons why, self-acclaimed enemies, Draco Malfoy and Harry Potter, had decided to drive to Hermione's wedding, when everyone on else was going by plane. The first reason was that Potter was broke, really broke; the guy lived off two-minute noodles for god's sake, and Draco didn't like to fly, and generally reacted violently when forced. So having both being invited to the wedding, but with no real means of getting there, they devised a pretty ill advised plan to briefly toss aside their hatred of one another, and drive to Hermione's wedding.

He probably should have been saying Ron and Hermione's wedding, but really, as far as he is concerned Ron is already married, It's just that Hermione needs him to say it out loud in front of a bunch of their friends and family, in a specific place, while wearing a suit and a ring. It was Hermione who had caved to the romanticism of all.

And now, here they are, trudging down the tarmac of a broken road towards the jagged silhouette of a town, looming closer in the distance. It is easier for Draco, he's got his boots, but all Potter has is flip-flops, because he's an idiot. Then again, Draco has to wear jeans and Potter's in shorts so maybe it evens itself out a bit. That's not important.

The air is hot and arid, and between them all they have is half a bottle of water, and a quarter of a bottle of whiskey, which they had found in the glovebox. They drink it mostly out of spite, and now their throats are dry and Draco was still swearing, but no longer smoking, and Harry is seriously considering calling someone, he isn't sure who he would call, but it probably would have felt good to call somebody. Ask for advice, order a pizza, something like that.

If they had cell reception anyway; which they didn't.

Draco swears at some rocks as they pass by, while harry sings scout songs and babbles incessantly, tiring to draw as much attention away from the fact that they're both hot, and annoyed, and thirsty and hungry, and bored, and angry at one another for no particular reason. He figures that if Draco were being irritated at him then he wouldn't have time to feel thirsty. He doesn't exactly know why Draco not feeling thirsty is so important to him, but it is, so he just continues and as requested Draco grows annoyed with him. Though no more than usual. He's probably too tired to throw an actual fit.

The town looms closer still as they stroll past oilrig after oilrig, kicking at stones, and staining their ears for any sound of a vehicle, preferably one with a working engine, air conditioning, a day spa, and a really, astoundingly friendly driver in it who will take care of them and give them cold things.

Draco coughs and swears and kicks another stone as they walk. It goes flying into the shrubbery and Harry claps sarcastically.

"One goal to Malfoy!" he yells with the faux enthusiasm of a commentator at a soccer match, "The crowd goes wild! Woo!"

Draco punches him in the arm but it's lacking in its usual force, Harry smirks.

They trudge.

…

The first thing they do when they reach the dusty, half there town is by cold drinks from a gas station and sit on the sidewalk in the shade to regain their strength. They drink slowly, and methodically, as if to make it last as long as possible, sitting in companionable silence as they watch the town do whatever towns do when there are only, like, three people in them. The town is small, barely even there, just serving as a place of residence for the workers working at the oilrigs. It barely has a corner stop, a Chinese restaurant and a pretty dingy looking hotel just across the way. They'd probably end up staying the night, it was nearly five anyway and they had not been planning to stop. That was the way that it worked.

They would take shifts driving, four hours on, four hours off. It was how they avoided actually conversing with one another, because surely if they had actual conversations then at least one of them would end up dead, if not both. This oil fiasco really had screwed up that plan.

Now they are actually going to spend time together.

A truck rolls past them and while the driver looks at them, they look back, understanding his surprise to find two, sweating young men sitting on the side walk, occasionally glaring at each other and drinking cheap-ass energy drinks and smelling like whiskey. Though he rolls on with no event, only raising his eyebrows at them, and giving them a firm look up and down. Harry even waves but he doesn't wave back.

Draco sneers at the back of his truck and drinks.

"So what do we do now?" Potter asks; they don't look at each other, no need. Draco stares out at the melting tarmac of the road, and scratches the back of neck.

"Get a room, I guess. Wait till morning to walk back."

He'd already fixed the leak, it had been easy, it was only a small tare; he'd just wrapped it in duck tape. It will hold until they reach a mechanic on the other side of desert. At least, he suspects it will; duct tape can do brilliant things.

He's tempted to start swearing again, but he doesn't. He just rolls up his sleeves.

"Do you think we'll make it to the wedding?" He still couldn't understand why Potter was asking him this, maybe because there was nobody else to ask. He suddenly wishes that he would stop. He has answers, but it always feels like he's giving something up when he says them out loud.

He doesn't like giving things up.

"If we're quick, by the skin of our teeth. We'll make it."

He brushes the hair out of his eyes, and he can tell that Potter is staring at him, but he doesn't stare back, not questioning why he would be staring in the first place.

It is pretty awkward that they are going to only just going to get there in time, considering that Harry is Ron's best man and Draco is one of Hermione's bridesmaids, or whatever they're called when they're a guy. But they are going to make it, and that's what matters.

He sees Potter smirk out of his peripheral vision. He smirks too, because why not? Harry was still below the lizards; they could smirk together if they so wished.

"If you call Hermione, I'll call Ron, and then we can get a hotel room and get Chinese food."

Draco's eyes flickered over to him, still smirking about something he can't quite place.

"I'd be fine with that."

…

"No, no, we'll make it," he says into his phone, walking towards the hotel, back slung over his shoulder. He can see Potter through the window of the Chinese restaurant having already ordered the food. He waves as Draco, and despite everything, Draco waves back.

Hermione says something on the other side of the phone and he isn't paying enough to catch what it is, so he just grunts questioningly and hears Hermione huff.

"Alright, well," she mutters into the phone, "if you don't make my wedding I will never speak to you again."

He smirks to himself.

"Do you promise?"

He shoulders open the door to the dingy hotel and is immediately hit was the smell of mildew and broken hopes and dreams, he wrinkles his nose against it.

"Oh, you bastard! If you don't make it to my wedding I will have to call you every single day, even on my honeymoon, and make you talk to me for half an hour everyday."

He smiles and the older woman at the desk looks up from her outdated magazine in surprise, as if seeing him was like seeing a unicorn.

"Don't worry," he says dismissively, lowering his voice now that they have company, "me and Harry'll get there in time, easy." And then he hangs up and approaches the dingy looking desk with the smiling woman and pockets his phone.

"Hi, I'd like to get a room for the night?"

For some reason it comes out more a question than a statement and the woman blinks at him blankly for a moment and he blinks back, hoping she'll say something like 'of course, would you like the suite with the spa or the flat screen tv?' He likes that idea. But she doesn't.

"Oh, well, you're in luck then sweetie, we only have one left."

He hopes in that moment, to god almighty that it is a large room, with two large beds, a mini fridge filled with candy bars and a nice bathroom.

But it isn't.

…

Potter comes through the door nearly the exact moment that the woman behind the desk with the unnaturally large smile hands him the keys and tells him the number of the room. She leans excitedly around him when Harry calls out him.

"Oh," she says loudly, "is that you're boyfriend?!" Harry immediately goes a little pink, and while he likes the fact he's flustered, he doesn't like the fact that it concerns him.

"No," he says, just to the left of a growl, and starts storming towards Potter whom is looking at him with an increasingly anxious expression. "We have a situation." This time he does growl, but it's okay because it's Potter and he's allowed to growl at Potter because he's Potter.

"And that would be?"

Potter looks at him cautiously, like he's a ticking bomb that he really wants to get away from, but it's just not social acceptable. The smell of the Chinese take out wafts up to Draco's nose and he relaxes a little at the thought that at least there will always be Chinese take out. Not always the appropriate number of beds, but there will always be Chinese food. That comforts him.

"They only had one room left," he says in defeat, his shoulders slumping and the anger seeping out of him. Green eyes look hopefully at him, and eyebrows shoot up into curly hair.

"What? Is this a tourist destination?"

Draco scowls at him, but is once again softened by the fact that he's holding dinner.

"This is where the oil workers stay during the week, and…" he trails off and sighs, "the room only has one bed… and no couch. And is tiny."

Potter looks at him for a moment, and he looks back with a deep frown. And then Potter goes very satisfying shade of red and looks like nearly all brain activity has ceased and steam is about to come out of his ears, and Draco crosses his arms across his chest and waits for some sort of verbal reaction.

"What…?"

"You heard me."

"So…" he's still pink, "what do we do?"

Draco sneers at him.

"We sleep in the goddamn bed you idiot!" He can practically sense the woman behind the desk looking at them, soaking up the drama. "And _you_ ," he says accusingly, eyes narrow, "you are not going to be even a little bit weird about it."


End file.
